TEC’s Pythonesque Attack on Ft. Worth Floundering UPDATED

As Texanglican sums up well, The Episcopal Church’s attempt to loot the Diocese of Ft. Worth by claiming to be THE REAL Diocese of Ft. Worth is not going very well.

First, the trial court judge has already ruled that the lawyers suing on behalf of TEC's "diocese" DO NOT represent the corporation known as the Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth that was established in 1983 and which Bishop Iker still heads. Yet the trial judge did not strike all the pleadings TEC's lawyers had filed claiming to act on behalf of the corporation at the time he ruled that they were not real diocese's lawyers. Logically, if these TEC lawyers do not represent the real diocese that actually owns the property, then they should not be able to even appear in court to file pleadings demanding that property be handed over to the folks they represent!

The appellate court has stayed any further proceedings until this fundamental illogic can be resolved. And that is GOOD news for the ACNA diocese--the real diocese of Fort Worth.

One wonders what sort of stimulant the worthies at 815 were drinking when they decided to pretend they and/or their puppets were the real Diocese of Ft. Worth in order to loot the Diocese of Ft. Worth. That strategy is, well, rather silly. It reminds me of the Monty Python School Prize-Giving sketch in which a thief mugs the Bishop of East Anglia, who was presiding over a school awards ceremony, and proceeds as follows:

I'm afraid there's been a mistake. The man who has been speaking to you is an impostor. He is not in fact the Bishop of East Anglia, but a man wanted by the police. I am the Bishop of East Anglia and anyone who doesn't believe me can look me up in the book. Now then, the first prize is this beautiful silver cup, which has been won by me. (He puts the silver cup into a sack) Next we come to the Fairfax Atkinson Trophy for outstanding achievement in the field of Applied Mathematics. Well, there was no-one this year who reached the required standard so it goes in my sack. And by an old rule of the school all the other silver trophies also go in my sack.

It makes for good humor, but a questionable legal strategy.


UPDATE:
The Diocese of Ft. Worth (Yes, the real one.) has issued a statement.

The Anglican Curmudgeon is following this closely, of course.